Seven Days Nowhere
by SirDeathShriek
Summary: "Ruby," her late uncle had said, "Pandora isn't all giant rock formations and deserts. And he'd told the truth. Pandora was the 'museum' of giant rock formations and deserts.
1. Bloodied Hands

Four ladies asked to go to Fyrestone one day.

"Fyrestone" meant two things: information, and a place to send a hated co-worker or an ex-spouse. But Marcus Kincaid, Gentleman Gunseller, was a business man first, and being a father figure wasn't worth a damn. They'd paid upfront to go to Fyrestone. So off they were to Fyrestone, warts and all.

Two of them sat together, a little girl in a cape and an older blonde. A pale girl in the seat over. And the last, the leggiest of the bunch, walked all the way to the back of the bus, her upper body wrapped in black and white and her legs in tight purple. They weren't Vault Hunters or criminals by any stretch of the imagination. He expected those types.

He exhaled and pulled the door lever, aware that he was driving a bunch of little girls across the desert to be eaten by wolves. None of them looked prepared for the dangers on Pandora. It would be a massacre the moment they stepped off the bus.

A shame, really. The blonde had a nice rack on her, too.

* * *

><p><strong>RWBY<strong>

Seven Days Nowhere

"Bloodied Hands"

* * *

><p>"Ruby," her late uncle had said, "Pandora isn't all giant rock formations and deserts. There's treasure there, and adventure, ripe for the taking!"<p>

The first part was definitely true.

Pandora was the _museum_ of giant rock formations and deserts.

In every direction: wasteland. When she'd gazed out the window an hour ago, giant rocks and canyons. Fifteen minutes ago, ooh, an even bigger canyon. Had a meteor come down and wiped the planet out, shattered Pandora into bits of dust ... nothing of value would be lost.

To those who didn't know about the Vault.

According to the pamphlet she'd picked out of the bin in the front, Pandora's sun rotated so slowly that a single day on Pandora lasted 90 hours. She blinked, read it again, and continued. Major settlements included Oasis, Sanctuary, Haven, Overlook, Jaynistown, and Jakob's Cove. Weird. Haven and Jaynistown were crossed out. She flipped the pamphlet around. It was dated almost twenty years ago, and there on the back cover, a picture of a town and children playing around in luscious gardens, carrying toys and playing tag. A woman, who she guessed was the mother, was carrying a pan full of brownies with little steam trails above them.

Ruby quietly put the pamphlet back where she'd found it.

Looking out her window again, the images repeated: Rocks and desert, sticks erected in the ground that doubled as pet graves, picket fences, surrounding rubble, and piles of ash with wooden planks poking out of them. White, willowy bubble gum shapes drifted overhead. Dilapidated buildings broke the scenery apart, but not the decay. Trucks lay melted with the slashes and rends of animal teeth, and mazes of scaffolding crisscrossed the mountainsides, shacks nestled on top of, or in-between them.

She grabbed her stomach when they crossed a dead body on the side of the road. Some of it. The leg, missing; a mess of entrails over a slope; she focused elsewhere.

Pandora made for an excellent corporate junkyard. How blisteringly clear that was, when a cylinder-shaped robot grazed the side of the armored bus with a laser. Their driver hardly seemed concerned and sped on by. It wasn't the first robot she'd seen on the trip. Many, like the turbines, tires, and miscellaneous, beaten-up vehicles strewn about, were half-buried in the dirt.

Skags surrounded the first lake they passed, a lake the most disgusting shade of green ever witnessed, populated with Pandora's premiere predator. The spiky, blood-eyed, triple-jawed omnivore that her uncle had apparently nick-named the 'skag' after watching one eat a man alive in front of him. He'd watched it all with cold eyes, and turned to his next prisoner, promising a similar death if he didn't get the answers he wanted. It didn't have anything to do with what Ruby had asked him, about why he gave them such an ugly name. But now, now especially, the memory brought plenty of comfort.

The Skags didn't stop at people. They didn't have a problem nesting around a giant, bubbling, toxic soup, and the eerie, emerald-glowing ones seemed to be _drooling_ puddles of acid, from the freaky hinges that she guessed counted as mouths. She had to take a picture.

A hand grabbed her shoulder, and her sister leaned over, on top of her, pointing out the window. "What's wrong with those ones?"

The glowing ones, she guessed. "They've been exposed to the waste chemicals so long, I think their biology just mutated to accommodate."

"They look diseased," said Yang, her blonde hair swaying to the left when she tilted her head.

When Yang finally got off of her, she added, "See those tiny puffs of smoke by their feet? They're drooling acid."

"How can you even see that?"

"Can't you?" she said, smirking. A speck of aura made her eyes flash silver. Hadn't Dad sent her sister to school first because she'd unlocked her Aura on her own?

"You and that eye thing," Yang huffed, "every chance you g-" She paused.

"Hm? What was that?" Ruby asked, focusing on the window.

"That girl was staring at us."

Ruby turned. Right across from them, a white ponytail flipped in the opposite direction oh-so-inconspicuously. Icicles grew from the back of the girl's skull.

"Um, did you want something?"

The girl practically whipped her head at them, blue marbles glaring. A crooked, red shape ran along the left eye, staining the alabaster. A bang of snowy hair hid the scar. The pale skin around that eye tightened. "Excuse me?" the girl asked.

"You were staring at us," she heard Yang reply.

"I was looking out that window, that's all."

She swung her head back around, crossing her arms, giving Ruby a better look at the back of her head. Ah. So the icicles growing off of Living Snowflake's head were just a tiara. Yang shrugged; so they went back to staring out the window.

"Military bases, you think?"

Large, bland gates with numbers and letters painted on them. RX-78-26. TX-55 Gear. Suda 51.

Ruby nodded. "_So_ military bases."

Faint shapes skittered along the horizon, sometimes running into the dark throats of caves, where she could only imagine what sort of terrible, night-dwelling parents skulked.

The corpse displays became more creative with time, and the bus managed to strike a bump in the road every time.

Her stomach crawled; bodies nailed to pikes, slabs, anything sturdy enough. Sometimes charred, maybe burned alive.

Of course, not that any of it frightened her. Not the masked people stalking the wastes, glancing their way every now and then. Not the rumble the bus made when they passed a broken-down billboard and something hit them. She bounced in her seat and grabbed the seat in front of her. A laugh gurgled from the front of the bus. She squinted ahead. The bus's driver pressed a button on his dashboard and the windshield wipers came on, smearing away the hideous spray of black and crimson. A putrid, yellow eyeball rolled free, smacked by a wiper blade, before a mist of silvery, purple liquid splashed across the front windows.

She almost missed the thing that rushed past her window. The poor, most certainly dead Skag flailed in the wind, flailing through the air until it clonked against the dirt, rolled a few seconds, and gave.

"_Ha ha_h, time to wake up ladies!" said the bus driver.

"It's a beautiful day, full of-"

"What in the world was that?" shouted Living Snowflake.

"A Skag," Yang answered.

And a Skag that was still being cleaned off the windows, at that. Nothing beautiful at all.

Living Snowflake put her hands on her hips. "Driver, why don't you watch where you're going?"

"Oh ha ho! Don't be fooled by appearances, Pandora is not a planet of love and peace, princess." The driver made a peace sign with his hand. "We're coming up on Fyrestone Depot, so gather up that sword and that poofy dress of yours and-"

"It's – a combat skirt!" she fired back, clenching her teeth.

"Yeah yeah, well, on Pandora, we frown on teensy liddle' pigstickers." His eyes darted at the overhead mirror. "What you're going to need is Marcus guns. We've got all kinds here: Jakobs, Torque, Hyperion, Atlas..."

"Guns," the girl replied, raising her chin. "are a crutch for the uninitiated."

The driver snickered. "Heh, it's your funeral."

"I beg your pardon-"

"You there in the back, ba-ba-black sheep," he cut her off, attention now on the person all the way at the back of the bus, avoiding all conversation. "_I_ _see_ that sheath on your back."

Living Snowflake huffed. Her eyes pinched shut and she folded her arms over her chest. They were already folded, but somehow she pushed her arms in even _tighter_. Ruby peeked at the dark-haired girl in the back, curious about the sheath the driver mentioned. A black bow rested firmly over her head, and her amber eyes sharpened. Her pale forehead furrowed at being called a sheep, but calmed a moment later.

In a knowing tone, Marcus said, "I hope you're quick on your feet then, because the only thing you'll be good for is carving up Skag or Rakk. I don't care what anyone says, Skag tastes _terrible_ no matter how you prepare it. I'd arm-wrestle a Bullymong before you'd get me to eat Skag again."

The dark-haired girl didn't reply, and went back to looking out her window. Another bump rattled the bus.

"And you, _little red riding hood_ over there."

Ruby pointed at herself. "Me?"

He nodded. "Yes, you." Not the worst nickname she'd ever gotten. "You're the biggest weirdo of the bunch."

Her jaw tensed. "Hey, what's that supposed to mean?" she flared.

"Let me tell you, I've been around the border worlds, missy. _Bad_ men make their homes on Pandora, bad men who do bad things to little girls like you."

Yang started to get up, but Ruby blocked her with an arm. "You think I can't take care of myself?"

"I think you haven't met the Flynt Brothers, or any of Sledge's psychotic brethren," he warned. "Trust me, you want no part of this insanity."

Ruby shot from her seat, jabbing her thumb at her chest. ""Oh trust me! I want every part of this insanity! See this?" She turned sideways. "This thing on my back? You want to know what it is? It's a collapsible scythe."

The driver lifted an eyebrow.

"You want to know what it transforms into? A gun. A _really_, _big_ gun. And as soon as I have the money, its going to be part-scythe, part-anti-everything gun!" Ruby fastened her hips, puffing out her chest. "What - do you say - to that?"

He didn't answer for half a minute, and then.

"I don't believe you."

"Oh you don't huh? Well then, mister driver. Just stop this bus for a second and I'll-"

The driver sneered. "On second thought, I believe ya. You want to know something else? Pyrrha Nikos is my grand-daughter! Ah haha haa haa haaha!" Ignoring her frown, his attention strolled away from her. "So let's make fun of the blonde with the big headlights now, eh?"

"Excuse me!?" shouted Yang, already out of her seat.

"I don't see any weapons on yo-AUH!"

A wail made the bus jolt to the left, the steering wheel abandoned. Ruby snatched the back of the seat in front of her. Inertia threw the bus forward before jerking back, making her crash against her seat.

Ruby heard her sister's voice, faintly, "Can we try that again?"

She took a moment to regain her balance and rub her spine, realizing that her sister's seat was empty. She spotted the orange scarf now at the front of the bus, and the arm that reached over the driver's seat. The muscles on that arm tensed, causing the bus's driver to let out a curse.

"I-I'm-sorry Miss!" he cried.

Yang released; straightening as the the driver took a huge breath, heaving against the steering wheel. "Thank you Mister Kincaid. Now that wasn't too _hard_, was it?" Yang spun around, clearly enjoying the music as she moseyed back to her seat, a single, red eye winking back at her sister before the red cooled back to blue.

Ruby held her palm low, and waited.

Yang sat back down.

Clap.

* * *

><p>The tiny smirk on Weiss's face drooped, remembering that, as well-deserved as it may have been, the childish retaliation had almost put them in a ravine.<p>

She'd heard that they were coming up on Fyrestone Depot at least. The white-fanned windmills along the hills, signs of civilization, and the series of gray towers with trails of wire dipping between them, along with the gigantic sign ahead of them that spelled "FYRESTONE" said as much.

Once the driver recovered, the bus started again, following the road toward an opening in the far mountains. She cared little that the greasy, perverted man, Marcus Kincaid, came from seven, sexually-depraved generations of merchants, or that Pandora was the roughest neck of the woods. Both were rather obvious , but still, he rambled on.

The words sloshed from his mouth as he talked about the badasses that lived on Pandora, and their even more "badass muthas". What an undignified, native tongue. She had no intention of doting in this place any longer than she had to.

Her stomach clenched.

Everything fizzled, the wastes, the filthy bus. White noise scratched her ear drums, and something wriggled inside her skull, gelling and swooshing. An image filled her vision. The image of a pale woman with a blob of static behind her. The woman stared back, eyes gleaming in a way that burnt the faded skin around them. Dark hair flapped against the sides of her face, suggesting wind.

Alarming as it was, Weiss remained still, aware of the scream trapped in her throat. Her eyeballs, earlobes, nostrils, and fingers turned numb. She was trained not to believe in something as contrived and stupid as apparitions.

"Don't be alarmed," the woman instructed her, in a voice frighteningly human. Behind her, sprays of water crinkled and hissed through the air. "I need you to stay calm, and don't let on that anyone is talking to you."

The ocean sprays increased, louder, fiercer, breaking into planks of silver and gray; two, great arms trying to strangle one another. The woman's face faded in and out of sight, eyes peering at her, flipping through the pages casually.

"In a moment, you'll be greeted by a funny little robot," she explained. "Do everything he says. You'll know what I mean when it happens. I'll contact you later."

The image dissipated, returning Weiss's surroundings. She looked around, whirling in her seat, blinking rapidly at the other passengers. Outside, the bus passed a rocky archway, heading toward a pair of rusted gates she assumed led into Fyrestone. Each gate hung open, allowing them entry.

A psychic attack? Weiss stared absently at the back of the seat in front of her, trying to analyze the situation. The girl wearing the cape opened and closed her mouth, exchanging glances with the blonde next to her. Weiss scowled. She'd sensed an aura from her before and the blonde moments ago.

It only made Weiss more suspicious. She stole a glance at the girl sitting in the back, the black ribbons that covered her arms, and the way her eyes focused ahead. She'd noticed something too.

"-hey, have any of you been listening to me?"

Weiss swallowed, ignoring the irritating driver's voice. The caped girl apologized, asking him to repeat what he'd said.

"I was saying – once you get into Fyrestone, check on Zed for me. He'll set you up at the New-U station and a shield. Don't expect anything quality out here in the sticks, but a crappy shield is better than catching bullets with your teeth."

"Zed? Who's that?"

"Were you even listening? I said he's the town doctor in Fyrestone. If you get into a tough scrape out there, just tell him that Marcus Kincaid sent you and he'll patch you right up. Just make sure to tell him that you _only_ want to be patched up and _don't_ let him inject you with anything, or give you a cybernetic arm, no matter how many machine guns or chainsaws he offers to put inside it."

As if she would ever let anyone from a backwater planet like Pandora operate on her.

The bus slowed to a stop. To their left, a gas station, or a motel for all she knew. A rickety, tiered sign above said "FYRESTONE", and a separate sign below it said, "MOTEL". Okay, motel then.

Protecting the town in spirit, a metal fence ran around Fyrestone's entrance, and if she squinted, she almost couldn't see the tears in it. Marcus told them to depart without preamble, or asking for a tip. Satisfied with both of these things, Weiss excused his rude tone and hurried off the bus as an ugly thought scurried into her brain.

No. She refused to believe that, that oaf could be some king of psychokinetic predator, or that he'd managed to catch her off guard. She dumped the thought, wanting to get as far away from the reek of the bus as possible. The silver-eyed girl hopped off of the bus, outdoing the blonde and the dark-haired girl after her.

Stomping her boots into the dirt as she landed, the cloak covering the girl's red and black corset pulled away to reveal a row of bullet casings. Short hair, curled bangs, and odd rosiness to her face, boots with red lace, a skirt - bullet casings? Weiss wanted to take a closer look.

But of course, the girl stood and turned around. Damn her.

Weiss _hoped_ she wasn't the culprit, those big, silver eyes of hers. Weiss's attention fell on the large, red rectangle attached to the girl's hip. The "soon-to-be-anti-everything gun" that supposedly transformed into a sniper rifle and a scythe...

...no.

Weiss blinked a couple of times. Her brain rolled over and paddled and kicked. It couldn't be.

That giant, mechanical duffel bag she kept on her back, if Weiss believed her at all, sounded familiar. A High-Caliber Sniper Scythe, one of the deadliest weapons in the known galaxy. Weiss processed that for a few moments. An HCSS on her back. The she'd sensed from her earlier, back on the bus...

An engine growled, and Weiss watched Marcus yank back a lever that made the bus's doors close. In no time at all, the bus grumbled away, following the skeleton pavement through an adjacent pair of gates.

Then a guffaw trickled through the distance, a mechanized voice. Near one of the gas station pumps, a rust-yellow robot approached the four of them. It teetered along on a single tire, its midsection, an inverted pyramid with a horizontal white stripe across it, jigging this way and that. A green-lit antenna stuck out from the tip of its flat head. The paintjob was cracked in several places, but Weiss recognized the Hyperion corporation model, in spite of the obvious neglect the robot suffered.

"Welcome to Fyrestone!" the robot greeted, "I am CL4PTPTP. You may call me by my locally designated name: Claptrap!" A panel flopped open on the robot's front, and a pair of arms, thin as rails, reached inside, grabbing a stack of devices. "Before continuing, please accept these ECHO communication devices, provided free of charge by the Dahl corporation!"

"Woah, a robot," Weiss heard, discovering that the voice belonged to the scythe wielder who was gawking at the robot with glassy eyes.

The Hyperion robot – Weiss found its nickname childish – handed over four, palm-sized tablets. A latch on the side opened a smaller compartment with a black pill inside.

"What's this thing do?" asked the blonde.

Heart rate activity. Oxygen content. Brain wave patterns. Exact measurement of blood lost during battle. Blood circulation. A portable weapons display-

"A good question!" the CL4PTPTP unit replied modestly. "Pandora's ECHO communication system is a way for users to connect and share content with their friends, family, and friend-enemies! You can record audio journals, submit personal information about yourself for scientific research purposes, and access our corporate geomapping satellites all over Pandora!"

"Huh," the girl drawled, rolling the dark pill between two of her fingers. She closed one eye and examined it. "So... what's this pill do?"

"That pill is a disposable nanomachine that must be consumed to provide access to the ECHOnet. To make a long contract service agreement short, simply ingest the pill so that our satellites can home in on you and inundate you with news updates and nifty deals!"

"Oh. Okay, I guess..." and with that, she swallowed her pill. Her friend, and the other girl, did the same.

"Another _awesome_ feature of the ECHO communication network," the robot continued. Ah-ha. Here was the catch, "is that by obtaining a digital copy of your bio signature, your DNA profile can be copied over to any New-U station operating within the current region!"

"What's that?"

"Another stunning question." Truly. The robot beckoned them to follow, making a whir as it spun around; they all followed, Weiss staying a few paces behind the rest, the pill squashed beneath her thumb, soft and round. She chucked the pill around her waist.

Clap... the Hyperion robot led them to a tall pole in the ground, a slightly, red-ringed disk at the bottom. The pole rose a few meters and stopped at a red light, two thin rails hanging on either side. A light blue, holographic panel was situated at the base of the machine.

To their right, a trail of tires embedded in the ground in some manner of garden path, or maybe a border line, each spaced about a foot apart, yet still lacking any organization.

"Step right up! This is the New-U station. When you use this device, your DNA profile is automatically identified and stored. Please activate the New-U station now!"

The dark-haired girl strolled forward, black coattails waggling behind her. The device beeped after she placed her hand on the panel, and she stepped aside, allowing the blonde to do the same. Again, the machine beeped.

It was Weiss's turn, but she remained right where she was. "No thank you."

"But madam, I haven't explained the purpose of the New-U station! Should an unfortunate incident occur-"

Beep. The silver-eyed girl placed her hand on the panel.

"I won't be requiring any of that," she said, closing her eyes.

The robot shrugged, and its single, camera lens-shaped eye flickered, gazing at the other three. "Misses Belladonna, Rose, and Xiao Long. Your New-U service contracts are guaranteed to last so long as you remain within 200 klicks of Pandora, provided you are connected to the ECHO network!"

Her mouth opened to argue.

Then someone shoved a spike through her right shoulder.

* * *

><p>The Schnee heiress tumbled, rolled, and snapped up, clutching her shoulder. The gunshot rang in the distance, and her eyes sliced every direction, searching for the shooter.<p>

Blake had already reached for Gambol Shroud.

"Bandits?" she heard the little robot panic, "Not again! Ruuuuun!"

Claptrap bailed in a hot second, beelining for the town's entrance. Her weapon buzzed as soon as it left its sheath, the blade folding back into pistol form, its sheath now a cleaver.

A shirtless figure hollered at them from above a smooth outcropping nearest the entrance to Fyrestone, a rifle in his hands. At the top of his lungs, he screamed:

"We got NEW AH-RYE-VALS!"

Car engines churned unseen, until two huge shadows drove above the outcropping, lunging through the air. Tires smacked against the ground, kicking up clumps of dirt. The other car sailed in the wrong direction, smashing into the town gate. The grind of metal ended with a crash, smoke and fire shooting into the sky.

Three more cars entered the vicinity. Each was a brown pod with four, ovular pods over each tire, barbaric turrets guarding over them. The drivers and their gunmen wore ragged outfits, metal plates stitched around their joints; their faces masked in white, gazing through blue eye sockets. Two cars made it to the ground and raced toward them.

The third car split horizontally, tendrils of mangled steel dividing the driver and the turret operator. A blur of crimson fluttered past it. By the outcropping, the shirtless gunman loped his way down, trying to get a better shot, rifle nestled under his armpit. He'd barely opened his mouth when Blake noticed the attack that slipped past her right side. Spikes, shards of crystal blasted from the ground and speared upward, rife with a cool mist. A white figure darted past her, but Blake salready potted a new target. The tires of one of the other cars gurgled, spitting up dirt as it neared. The cars had scattered in different directions.

In one powerful leap, she soared over them, katana and cleaver readied. Blurs of red and black, of gold and red assailed the other cars in violent flashes. One by one, the engines quieted.

Gambol Shroud flew from her hand, and buried itself in the throat of one bandit. The black ribbon attached to the weapon went taut. Blake shifted, clinging as the armored car drove on. A second Blake manifested, only to fizzle out of existence as Blake lanced downward, ribbon bending after her.

Her boots thumped against the car's frame, extending her hand. The black ribbon animated, pulling the katana from the bandit's throat and wrapping itself back around her arm. Once it gathered, Blake swung the sheath with her other hand, the driver unaware. Crunch. She braced, hugging the roof of the car as it skidded and stopped.

Before her, a wall of white crystal, the size of some behemoth creature, had torn from the planet's very crust. The wall cut through the road by the bus stop, stopping short of the smooth outcropping.

Near that end of it, the snow-haired girl stormed toward a shuddering bandit, who'd well soiled his orange pants by that point, his firearm missing. Blood darkened her sleeve and scrapes lined her knees. She made no effort to sheath the rapier in her left hand.

"Please don't kill me!" another voice begged.

Blake spied a fluttering cape, and a scythe held below it. In front of the scythe wielder, another bandit lay wounded. Before she heard the girl's reply, another gunshot cracked the air.

Metal groaned under a golden fist, by an overturned car. Then the blonde faced them, and went to where the caped girl was. Another car had flipped over, dented in multiple places.

The air cracked with more gunshots. Heads turned.

To the entrance of Fyrestone where one of the cars had knocked down the gate and gone up in flames, where a single man lumbered out, his outfit dark and shredded, his blue-eyed mask blistered. The bandit let out a garbled yell, and raised the pistol in his left hand.

Blake hurled Gambol Shroud before he could fire, a single, powerful round propelling it forward. Shick. His arm winged upward and the pistol flashed, the bullet flickering into the sky. She popped the weapon back after, and the bandit heaped forward with a gash through his neckline.

She joined the others, their weapons drawn as they surrounded three of the survivors. The closer she was, the more confusion stirred. She glanced privately at the scythe that the girl in red carried, the absolutely-larger-than-the-person-carrying-and-slashing-through-cars-with-it scythe. Judging from the way the bandits shuddered, they recognized it too.

"Tell us who you are," demanded the girl in white, now on her left, "and why you attacked a bunch of tourists. Now."

The bandit in the orange pants cried: "I'm going to put so many _fresh_ holes in you before this is over!"

Blake's eyes thinned.

* * *

><p>Tire treads chewing along the gravel when the CL4PTPTP unit returned. During the bandit attack, the machine had taken cover, hiding in some excuse for a shack scrapped together with some sheets of metal and a roof. Uttering his thanks for removing the bandits, and not the least bit hiding his shock, his programming dictated that he introduce them to Fyrestone and the remaining locals. He guided them into a few "back streets", for lack of a better term.<p>

"How disgusting," muttered Weiss.

The bandits claimed to be working for a man named Nine-Toes. But that mattered little. It was blind terrorism, hardly an organized attack. At best, one of them had gotten in a lucky shot that grazed her shoulder at best. She'd responded by destroying their vehicles, and in the process, learned that the other passengers were nowhere near as defenseless as they seemed.

Here she was, five minutes off the bus and nursing a bullet wound. She hated Pandora.

Tenements waited inside these 'back streets', side-by-side. A gravel path led into the town proper, where banners of red, white, black, and green hung overhead, many patched together, tattered, or riddled with bullet holes. Scrap metal walls sectioned the street in a faulty attempt to keep out wildlife. The street ended, in a place where the CL4PTPTP unit tried to open a gateway that was basically a giant, metal plate someone had stripped from a vehicle, attached to several, smaller plates.

It led them into what had to be a garbage dump. Weiss almost drew her rapier and demanded to be led back into town. Everything looked septic. Piles of broken robot parts covered piles of trash and rotting meals, littering the area. Tall, corrugated planks rose and leaned against rocks and one-story, dome-shaped houses that populated the town. They hadn't found a soul, but the reek from the latrines and exposed toilets suggested otherwise.

The Hyperion robot stopped to show them a large, mechanical chest along their route. The dull red paint showed, but the chest contained green sensors on its front, indicating occupancy.

"Please, open this container, brave travelers!" it said with a gesture.

Weiss waited, and the girl with the black bow complied. When she touched the chest, it flickered to life and the top flipped open, revealing a single, dust-covered repeater pistol.

"Ooh. That looks it could really do some damage!" the robot claimed.

Weiss closed her eyes, exhaling through her nose.

"Yeah...not really," said the girl with the bow.

"Huh?"

"She's right," Scythe Girl piped up, picking up the pistol, which was larger than her own hand. "That's a really basic design, probably no higher than a Class 3. It wouldn't help any of us in a fight, and I doubt we could scrounge together ammunition for it anyway." With an eyebrow raised, Weiss watched her walk over to the robot and offer the weapon over. "How about you hold onto it?"

"Me?" sparked the Hyperion robot. "You're... you're handing _me_ a gun?"

She gave him a nod. "Well yeah."

The blonde protested, "Uh, sis? Are you sure that's a good idea?"

Huh. Those two were sisters then. But what had the robot called the blonde again? Miss Xiao-what?

"Look, the four of us aren't going to be around here for long, and with those bandits around, I don't want the nice robot to get hurt, or be defenseless all the time."

Accepting the firearm, Weiss stepped back when the robot bounced around on its axis. "Thank - you - madam!" it declared, dropping the pistol into the same drawer as the ECHO devices. "I have a feeling that _you_ and _I_ are going to be great friends!"

When they finally entered what was supposed to be a town, their surroundings improved marginally; buildings more closed-in, gates with fewer holes in them. Even a vehicle garage to their left, with a beat-up vehicle parked there. A huge, gunmetal gate blocked another garage. The girl with the bow hadn't spoken a word since, while the sisters chattered about how they'd dealt with the local ruffians, and their frequent stares and glances were rather irritating.

Tattered overhangs rustled along roofs, sharing the same dirty shade of red as the posters plastered all over town. On each poster, a fiendish, red-eyed shadow of an armored soldier stared back, spouting the same, emblazoned text: "THE CRIMSON LANCE". Such torrid propaganda. How much influence could the Lance possibly have over a ghost town like this with bandits attacking the new arrivals?

"Attention citizen of Fyrestone!" called CL4PTPTP. "There is no cause for alarm. Our new visitors have revolved the problem! Permanently!"

Her eye twitched. Citizen, it had said. Not _citizens_.

"Well shoot," said a voice on her ECHO device. "I had to lock up the place after that last attack. Thought I was a goner this time." Weiss turned the device over, idly curious as to why she'd kept it in the first place. A man in a surgical mask and frock, and a shirt with a corporate logo on the shoulder appeared on the screen.

"Please come outside Doctor! There's a young woman out front in dire need of medical attention."

The Hyperion robot stood... sat... crouched... waited, in front of a door to the second garage, a large 3 painted on the side of the building. Weiss stood behind the other three, keeping Scythe Girl and her blonde sibling in her line of sight. "Come on! Damn it, blasted circuits are on the fritz again!" The man speaking to them through the ECHOnet bore a heavy, frontier planet drawl in his voice. "Give it a go from out there, would ya? I'll let ya folks right in, seein' as you saved mah' bacon and'all."

Clap... the Hyperion robot hummed a tune and pressed one hand on a panel by the building's front door. "Way points, way points," it chirped, over and over. Great. She'd already lost the feeling in her right arm, and now the CL4PTPTP was malfunctioning.

But whatever it had done, the garage door rattled and lifted, squealing on the rusted tracks. A pair of blood-splattered boots stepped out. Her eyes traveled up and down, from the blood-splattered boots that moved from the shadows, to the blood-stained gloves that waved at the five of them.

"Name's Zed," he greeted. "They don't let me operate on people no'more since I lost my license. Now I keep the med vendors around her running – more or less."

Her jaw widened. Blood dripped from a buzz saw in the graying doctor's right hand. A bloody, bloody buzz saw. His looked directly at her. "I take it you're the one in need of some good-ol TLZ? Heh heh, you're lucky I keep the morphine on tap."

She really _was_ going to leave Pandora with some manner of disease, wasn't she?

The doctor rounded on her, the three girls in front of her clearing a path for him. He peeked at the tourniquet around her shoulder that she'd fashioned from part of her sleeve, the light blue fabric now damp and unsightly. He put both hands on her arm, examining the injury. She made a mental note of which side of her hip her weapon was on. He drummed his fingers along her arm. She winced; his fingers tugged at the makeshift tourniquet.

"Hmm. A corrosive from the looks of it, but just a graze. Nothing magical science can't handle." He waved at the other four. "Come on inside before more bandits show up. I don't want 'you girls or any of mah equipment getting' shot up."

They complied, and Weiss shook her head. "Wait a moment. Corrosive? You mean an acidic round?"

"That's k'orrect, darling."

She pulled her arm away. "That doesn't make any sense."

Zed shrugged, closing the garage door behind the other three, and the robot, who wheeled itself inside and started waving the pistol around in its hand.

"Ooh, ooh! Zed! Check out, the, uh, _piece_ that one of the newcomers bestowed upon me!"

"Claptrap," growled Zed, "if you don't put that thing away, I'm tying you to a fence and leaving you outside for the Skags!"

"Aww, but Zed, it's a really cool gun!"

The 'medical station' as it were wasn't any cleaner than the rest of Fyrestone. Searching for a light switch, Weiss spotted the medical table pushed toward the back, and the body on top of it.

The lights flashed on.

Weiss made out blond hair. Where she expected fingers, instead, a white gauze covered in red splotches, going up as far as the person's wrist. It was a boy wearing jeans and a black jacket. The operating table was, in fact, just an ordinary table with a sheet over it. Not a shred of carpet in sight, and something dripped by the front of the table. Weiss glanced at Zed and the buzz saw. Then back to the table; the dripping sound; the gauze.

And the severed hand laying on the floor.


	2. Assassin

So you want to hear a story, huh? One about muscled, gun-toting beefcakes arm-wrestling the forces of darkness for control of the universe?

Uh, sorry. Wrong book.

The story you're going to hear is about... Pandora. When people talk about Pandora, they're not talking about a children's lunchbox, no. The saying goes, "Home is where the _heart_ is." Well, _Pandora_, is where the _Vault_ is, a local legend. Advanced alien technology. Money, more than you could ever spend in one lifetime!. Hrh-hrm. Women.

And it's this very legend that brings our heroes together, perhaps. Maybe. Anyway, the legend of the Vault is real, and it is here on Pandora. And our tale begins when our heroes make their way to a place called Fyrestone, the last place you ever want to be on Pandora. When they got there, they were forced to defend themselves from the locals...

One of them was injured in the encounter, so the gang voyaged into town in search of a doctor...

And as bad luck would have it, they were able to find him.

::::

Seven Days Nowhere

2.

::::

Jaune. That was the name of the blond lying on Dr. Zed's operating table, currently missing his right hand.

Ruby dwelt on that, or tried to, while they all gathered around him. Living Snowflake was the first to demand an explanation, not that she blamed her.

"Well," the doctor began, "I'd say... 'was about half a week ago. Found him crawling into town with his arm chewed to bits. Managed to keep his arm from bleeding all over the place, but the only way he's getting back on his feet is with some medical supplies from a vendor a small way from town. Right now, he's out like a light."

They'd entered Fyrestone quickly. When she saw the body sitting on the table, she stopped, inches away from where the garage door lowered, and the girl with the bow did the same; she recovered faster. Ruby paced after her, moving to get a closer look at the unconscious boy in the hooded jacket when the lights came on.

Glancing around the makeshift office now, Ruby noticed the medical tools and instruments strewn about the decaying shelves, the boxes and crates thrown haphazardly across the room, some large enough to sit down on. The white chest plate of their unconscious guest glinted beneath the ceiling lights, attached to his upper body by copper-colored bands.

There was a severed hand on the floor.

"Let me guess," the girl with the bow spoke up. "Bandits got in the way."

There was a severed _hand_ on the floor.

"Skags too. 'Hole nest of em, er, nested around the vendor with the parts I need to fix the one in here." He nicked his head to the left, pointing to the soda machine-shaped thing leaning on its side next to the alcove. A picture of his face and a giant needle covered the front of it. "All I'd need is maybe a hundred-fifty HP's of insta-Health and he'd be good as new."

Living Snowflake drew herself up, and her boots clacked impatiently against the floor. "This Insta-Health. Am I to assume that's what you'll be using to treat my injury as well?"

"I wasn't expecting new arrivals, honestly." Ruby cringed at the way the doctor chuckled saying that. "I was hoping I'd be able to refill my organ fridge in a couple of days. but yes, a lil' insta-Health'll fix both of ya' right up. It's getting' the stuff that's the kicker."

Claptrap rolled next to the table with a whir. "Woah, woah, woah! Hold on there, travelers! Now, I know you girls can handle yourselves from the way you handled those bandits earlier, but heading outside the town of Fyrestone is suicide!"

"He's right. If you're going to head out of town, you're going to need a shield."

"Trust me, that won't be a problem," said Ruby. She peered over at her sister. "We can't just take off with two injured people here."

Yang crossed her arms and pondered it. "Yeah, I guess you're right; wouldn't be very neighborly. Okay doc, just point us in the right direction."

"If you say so," he deadpanned. "Now the stuff you're looking for should be in a bunch of vials and bottles. The vendor's just past the gates south a'here. Make a' left and keep going till you find a shed next to some pretty, distinguishable brown and gray rocks. I took a peek with my binoculars a little while ago. Seems some Skags might'a made their home there. I have to spare what bullets I have to fend off the bandits, so I can't waste'em trying to scare away wildlife. You understand."

"Won't be a problem," boasted Ruby in a singsong voice. "Claptrap, you don't mind showing us the way out of town, do you?"

"Absolutely, posa-tootley not, new best friend," he said, bobbing in a way that resembled a nod. He ushered them to the exit and pressed the door switch to open it. "Anybody who wants to catch the express out of Fyrestone, fol-low me!"

Living Snowflake clutched her wounded arm, shoulders high as she walked. "Yes please, I'd like to get this treated and be on my way as soon as possible."

Sunlight rushed in as the garage opened. The girl in the black bow held a slip of paper to the doctor and mumbled something. Ruby barely heard his response. "No, I... haven't seen...sorry." By the time the girl turned around, Ruby was already outside.

Yang patted her shoulder. "Come on sis, let's find those medicine-thingys and see if we can't scrounge together some breakfast," she said, making a fist.

A larger, fortified building rested to the left, and past it, Living Snowflake and Claptrap were on the other side of a graveyard. laid a graveyard. Ruby's face crinkled while they

They swung around Zed's building, following a path between it and a larger, fortified building. Ahead, on the other side of a graveyard, rugged, dent-filled scraps of metal formed a wall around the southern entrance into town, lodged between two crags. Calling it a wall might have been generous; it wouldn't have kept out a family of rabbits, much less a gang of raiders or aggressive wildlife. Ruby's face crinkled at the crusted tires marking several graves.

A wireframe segment formed the middle of the gate, where Living Snowflake stood. Claptrap fiddled with a console in front of her, arms extended, tapping the console vigorously in some robotic equivalent of a spasm. Above them, glorified formations of rock peeked over the gate, an orange-white silo sitting over one of the flatter crags.

The air buzzed with activity when somewhere, a mountain sneezed.

"What was that?"

Yang pointed. "Over there, I saw something over that ridge!"

Orange flashes pattered through the sky. Car engines hollered in the distance.

"Get down!" shouted Ruby, her voice falling below the roar of a nearby engine. She snatched Crescent Rose from her back, not bothering to extend it fully.

"Blast'em!" somebody shouted from outside.

Claptrap shrieked as the first car raced past the gate, firing an orange flare from its rear. The missile punched through the wireframe section of the gate without stopping, speeding toward Living Snowflake.

Ruby gripped Crescent Rose, but the white-haired girl reacted sooner.

Rapier now in her left hand, Living Snowflake's hands flashed with movement, and a white construct bled into existence before her, changing to a bluish color just as the rocket struck. The explosion, not to be denied its prey, reached around the floating barrier to engulf Claptrap, launching him back, the right side of his body blackened, scorched.

A second, white construct formed beneath the white-haired girl's feet, and she flipped backwards through the air, disappearing over Ruby's line of sight.

Thunder boomed when a figure tried climbing over the left side of the gate. The bandit, nearly over, was fortunately unable to witness the explosion, the impact that blasted his head and upper torso apart. Four more bandits, alarmed by the gunshots, negotiated the fence with gusto.

They, too, disappeared in a flurry of limbs and violence. Red blotches splattered over the fence, over top piles of arms and legs, reduced to bloodied stumps.

The girl in the bow stalked forward, a thin sword in her hand, and a wider one in the other. "I'll take care of the ones on the other-"

Ruby ignored her, popping forward in the blink of an eye, cape flitting behind her, billowing into the shape of an enormous, crimson beast. On the other side of the gate, she saw bandit colors, their muddy browns and their orange goggles, their white face masks. Most of their vests were covered in dirt. These men had lived in the wasteland for a long time. Most probably never knew what a high caliber sniper scythe looked in its rifle form, or recognized the mechanisms winding and shifting when the scythe's skeleton extended fully.

Heads whipped in her direction; some even managed a gasp or a yell, moments before she winged them skyward.

Flipping the scythe over, she crouched and took aim, not breathing. Her mind was quiet, her expression unusually blank as the car she fired on, two bandits seated within, bursted into a blistering scream of black and orange.

She leapt and swung the scythe around. The blade snarled as it smashed through the hood of another car, parked farther from the rest, and scraped backward, splitting through the metal.

"What the, oh oh holy shi-"

Two men scrambled from the car.

The one on the right drew his gun. "Come on little one, time to die!"

She dashed and the back of her scythe into the side of his head, sending him sprawling into the dirt, end-over-end.

"You're gonna pay for that!" his buddy cried, a pistol already in his hand.

She reappeared, above him, and watched as he fired where she'd stood a moment before. He gasped when she landed on his shoulders. Alighting, she leaned forward, squeezing his neck between her boots, and flipped backward, hoisting him off the ground.

They somersaulted in tandem until she was over him once more, straightening as the bandit's head thwacked the ground. As she did, two soft thumps landed next to her. She whirled her scythe around. The girl in white and the girl in black faced her, their gazes on her briefly until they found the wrecked, burning vehicles around her.

Yang maneuvered through the twisted opening left by the bandit's missile, calling to her, but Ruby's attention was on the last two bandits. One of them had a broken neck. The other probably did too.

Snowflake padded up to that bandit and rolled him over, placing a hand over his mouth.

"You okay?" Yang asked hesitantly.

Ruby lowered her scythe, watching as the bandit wriggled lightly on the ground, unable to flee.

"I'm fine," she muttered.

She closed her eyes and exhaled through her nose. She vanished in a flutter of red, heading back into town.

::::

"Sounds like you got under Nine-Toes's skin." Zed, for understandable reasons, opted not to wager coming outside to check the source of all the commotion. Instead, Blake pulled out her ECHO device, and on the screen she saw the mustached doctor's face talking to them through a video screen. "Don't worry; he'll get what's coming to him. Head east. The shed'll come up shortly."

Blake surveyed the aftermath of the second bandit attack with a frown. That girl's scythe had trashed the bandit's vehicles. One flame-ridden car beat with black smoke and char. A trench was dug through the hood of another, the engine carved to pieces.

She spotted a road leading away out of town. An electrical system seemed to stretch in that direction on the right side of a ravine, but she didn't know for how long, and the utility poles were only in view for so long before they traveled behind a formation of rock. Her arms were covered in sweat, and she'd only arrived a few hours ago. So an excruciating search through the wastes to find the next settlement was out.

The Schnee girl stomped about after searching through the wreckage, no more thrilled to be stuck in Fyrestone as she was. From the way she stormed about, the wound on her should wasn't half of a concern. "Ugh, of course this would happen!" she groaned. "Now the only other vehicle is that worn-down clinker back in town!"

Blake had forgotten about that. At least there was some form of salvageable transportation around.

The Schnee peered around her. "I think I can see the shack from here."

"Hold on a second," she said with a hand gesture. "That robot was damaged, maybe we should see if we can he-"

"_I_ require medical assistance and so does that other patient," the girl cut her off, shrugging with the same bleeding shoulder, "We can't waste time on a robot that's going to be repaired, or melted down for spare parts anyway."

The Schnee girl walked past her, and she resisted the urge to do the same. She cursed mentally. If only she'd gotten out here first, she could've taken out the bandits and left right then.

Claptrap's wounded cries tugged on her ears. She pivoted to where the scythe-carrying girl and her sister tended to the machine, listening to it on its deathbed. One half of its body was riddled and leaking fluid, oil. His programming made him cruelly, humanly aware that he was finished.

The scythe-carrying sister knelt over him while the blonde asked her questions, most of which caused the caped girl to sulk. She petted the machine and mumbled something to her sister. Then, with sullen eyes, they left the wriggling, dying robot behind.

Blake couldn't help but approach them, eggshells crackling underfoot.

"His motors are slagged and his power core is shutting down." The dark-haired girl answered her first question, eyes tilting downward. "The rocket hit the side of his chassis where the repeater was, so the damage is probably even worse, and some parts are too hot to even touch." Her eyes snapped up determinedly. "We should hurry."

Blake didn't argue, didn't even want, and the three headed left down the road.

A familiar, ghastly blue stung the corners of her eyeballs.

And suddenly she was there, that mysterious woman again.

"I knew you four were the right people for the job," the woman said. "I was looking for someone who could handle themselves in a shoot out but... just, wow. You'll need that sort of skill for the journey ahead."

Blake stopped in her tracks, and so did the other two. Ahead of them, Schnee did the same. When the ghostly woman faded, her head whipped left and right before she moved forward again.

But the three of them glanced at one another, and Blake put her hand around her weapon. The scythe carrier raised an eyebrow.

"Did you..."

The blonde interrupted her sister. "Wait, so you both saw Ghost Lady too?"

A noise distracted the trio. In front of them, more of those white crystals ripped through the ground, except they were painted a murky red. Impaled on their jagged tips were four-legged creatures, squirming as the life oozed from their bodies.

The Schnee girl stood and cleaned the dirt from her hands. By her feet was a puny Skag, a pup, which was stuck to the ground by her rapier. Blood pooled just a few inches away from white, stainless boots.

She stomped her foot and yelled to them, "If any of you guys don't mind, I could use some help carrying the medicine back. My shoulder is killing me."

The blonde and her sister shrugged and headed over, Blake following silently.

::::

Among other oddities, the scythe-carrier knew exactly what she was doing when they took the abandoned vending machine apart. Blake watched her, hands snatching things here, there, everywhere. Schnee asked her to stand aside, wanting to find the medicine and leave. Without uttering a word, the dark-haired girl handed over a pink, ovular syringe, labeled INSTA-HEALTH on the casing. Mildly surprised, she took the coupling and left the focused mechanic to her business, heading back into town.

"You're kidding me Ruby," said the blonde, leaning over her sister's shoulder. "Don't tell me you actually know what all those parts you're removing are."

Ruby. So that was her name. "You know, I think if I pull this out," she replied, shucking a lengthy section of wire over one shoulder. "And take this with us; I can use some of these to fix Claptrap."

"That's great, but what do you want to do after that? We stil-"

"Ruby, is it?" Their heads turned to her, just as Ruby bit down on a steel-colored cord. "My name is Blake."

"Oh," the blonde faced her. "Yang. Yang Xiaolong!"

Ruby spat a piece of chewed cord on the ground and smiled. "Ruby Rose. It's nice to meet you!"

Returning the pleasantry, Blake crouched near the door of the shed. They'd found it behind the white crystals that the Schnee used to kill the Skags with, crystals that, now, were beginning to thaw. She was a Dust user, no doubt.

Ruby Rose and Yang Xiaolong; both names sounded strangely uplifting. But she blamed Pandora for that.

"Let's get back to that vision we saw," she suggested. Ruby went back to dissecting the vending machine. Her sister crossed her arms.

"I saw that strange woman back when we were on the bus."

"Yang, why didn't you say anything then?" her sister said with an accusing glare.

She shrugged. "Why didn't you?" Ruby paused and went back to what she was doing.

"What did she say to you guys?" asked Blake. "She told me to stay calm and not to say anything. Then she told me to follow that Claptrap and do everything he said. I wasn't sure about it when those bandits attacked us."

"Yeah, same here."

"Mine, too," her sister chimed in.

"What do you think it means?"

"Beats me," Yang replied. "But I'm not sure we should trust some random woman in our heads."

"You think..." Blake looked down at her ECHO device, "...it could be the ECHO devices that Claptrap gave us?"

"Maybe, but we didn't get them until we got off the bus."

A metal part clacked on the ground. "Now that you mention that – _hggh-_" Ruby got up with a heap of scavenged pieces and chunks held between her arms. "I... wonder if that other girl saw the same thing we did."

"Who is she anyway?"

"She's part of the Schnee Dust Company," Blake answered. "They're a big name throughout the galactic territories."

Yang's features tensed up in thought. "One of the top Dust distributors in the world. I thought I recognized that fighting style."

"We should ask her."

::::

Copper and bronze rustled as it dropped together in a pile, dropped from the arms of a teenage girl wearing a cape, immediately plunging her hands inside to sort through it.

Blake paused to observe, impressed by her determination. Claptrap continued to shiver on the ground, spouting that his end was near, occasionally shaking upward before his servos failed once again. Every failed attempt made his wails more painful to listen to, for Blake in particular. Yang came alongside of Ruby and helped, clearly eager to put an end to the robot's death rattle.

Talking to Schnee was up to Blake, then.

The very person-in-question stormed from Zed's "office", a bandage wrapped around her grazed shoulder. The directness of her gait hadn't changed since they'd gotten off the bus.

"The procedure, for _lack_ of a better term," Schnee said, "was a success. Now Dr. Zed claims that the only way out of Fyrestone is if we can repair something called a... Catch-A-Ryyye, I think."

"Catch-A-Ride?"

"Whatever," she said, pouting. "The bandits have set up checkpoints to keep the townsfolk from fleeing to safer areas, and the quickest way to get around them is over a canyon with a vulgar name. Judging from the way you handle yourself, I'd ask that you or one of the other two accompany me."

"Accompany you?"

The white-haired girl held out her bandaged arm. "I'm _wounded_, remember? And traveling in pairs is safer than searching a wasteland all alone. I could pass out from heat stroke." She made an exaggerated face, and balled her fists in front of her mouth in mock terror. "Or worse, bandits might find me, a young lady, passed out in the wastes and take advantage of me in my weakened state!"

Blake fought back a smirk. "Okay, okay, just... I need to ask you something first."

"Ugh, fine." The Schnee folded her arms, irritation leaking out. "Just be quick about it."

"Well, first, I know your last name is Schnee."

The irritation was replaced with seriousness.

"I don't really care about that, but it'd be easier if I could refer to you by your first name instead of just by your family's."

The girl seemed to dwell on this, lifting her chin on one finger while her eyes gleaned upward. "Tell me your name first," she ordered, "and I'll tell you mine."

Blake squeezed her eyes shut. "It's Blake. Just Blake."

"Hmph." The white-haired girl huffed and extended her hand. "Weiss."

She pulled her hand back just as Blake reached for it. "_Just_ Weiss. I mean it. I don't want those two," she flicked her eyes at the graveyard, "or anyone else finding out my family's name. The last thing I need is the whole planet coming down here to try and kidnap me."

"It's a little late for those two." Blake shifted her head at them, spying that the pile of salvaged machinery had grown much smaller. "We were talking about the same thing I wanted to talk to you about."

Weiss scowled, and relaxed a few seconds later, closing her eyes. "Fine. Please just spit it out so we can get a move on."

Blake cleared her throat and calmly asked, "Did you see a woman in front of you a few minutes ago? Did she tell you to do anything?"

Weiss opened her left eye and adjusted herself. "You... saw her too?"

"Woo-hoo!"

The sound hooted through the air as Claptrap sprang to life. The little robot literally hopped to his feet, with a pair of mechanical flaps, one of them at least, clacking on the left side of his body.

"Uh, I mean... like a boss!" he shouted, startling Ruby and Yang.

Weiss ignored them. "What else did you see?"

"The rest of us saw her when we got off the bus, and she mentioned 'the four of us' when we left the town. We don't think it's because of the ECHO network." The Schnee was visibly uncomfortable when she said that.

"I don't know what sort of mischief this is, but I have things to do outside of this dingy, so-called town. Excuse me" she said, already walking away.

Still perplexed, Blake floated into Zed's workshop where the doctor was already at work on the other patient. Apparently he'd finished already. The blond sat up and stretched, and when he spotted her approaching the garage, he let Zed know. The doctor removed his gloves and tossed them on the floor, exchanging them for new ones he'd left on a desk. A faint glow from the medical vendor told her that it was up and running again.

"You're one of the girls that saved me, right?" asked the boy.

"Yeah. My name is Blake, it's nice to meet you."

The boy colored with delight. "Jaune," he introduced himself as he hopped from the operating table. "Jaun_e_ _A_rc, short and sweet. So how'd you guys find me?"

Blake shook her head. "We didn't. We were... just passing through actually."

His jaw dropped a bit, before he repeated her words. "Passing... through?"

"I'm just a tourist. A photographer," she added quickly. "I came to Pandora for an assignment, photographing rare birds from the border worlds. We came to Fyrestone by bus and got attacked, so we ended up here."

Disappoint spread over him, but he thanked her. " Anyway, even if you guys were only around because of coincidence, you saved my butt."

Zed propped his hand on the table. "Um, excuse me?"

"Sorry, you too doc'."

"Jaune," Blake interrupted. "Would you mind if Zed and I talked for a moment?"

"Oh. Ah, sure." Jaune bowed his head, and took care to make his way past her. A smooth, gray apparatus covered his hand, metal worked into the shape of a human arm. The light gray sheath on his left hip slipped out of her peripheral vision.

She listened until his footsteps were well out of the garage.

"Well, that should cover it kid," said the doctor, reaching to pick his buzz saw out of a container on the floor. "I told Ice Queen back there how to get out of Fyrestone. _You_ got what _you_ need, now, unless you're interested in paying work, you ladies better scram before Nine-Toes figures out what's going on."

"Just one more thing." Blake reached into her pocket and pulled out the photograph. She had to be sure. "You're _sure_ New Haven's the best place to find her?"

"Look darlin'," he said, chewing on her temper. "I just keep the medical equipment running, more or less. It's not my job to keep tabs of everyone on this rock. Last time I heard anything about that witch was in New Haven."

She started to apologize.

Started to.

Her legs moved in the other direction, not even sparing Zed a parting glance. One thing rested on her mind.

New Haven was the next place she had to look.

::::

It was a welcome mirth.

"Woo- _woo_! Viva la Claptrap-Supreme! All hail the new and improved, Interplanetary Ninja Assassin Claptrap!"

The little yellow robot hopped off the ground and swiveled at them, giving her and Yang a curious, mechanical once-over. Then he reached for the sides of his head, reaching into a flap and the hole where the other flap was supposed to be, and fished out a pair of metal throwing stars.

Yang's fists went up before Ruby brought them down. "No, look. See? He's not attacking."

Instead of hurling the shuriken at their throats, Claptrap danced, flagging his arms with shurikens in each clamp. "Do, do, do! I – am – the best robot – _yeah_! I - am - the best robot – _yeah_!"

She snickered. "You're okay then?"

The little machine swung around, facing her, and in a blink of movement, he rolled over and hugged her.

"Thank you thank you thank you," he cried. "You're the _best_ new arrival ever!"

Yang grimaced. "Where were you hiding those when we were fighting? And for that matter: _interplanetary_ _ninja assassin_? What does that even _mean_?"

Claptrap straightened his arms into a 'V' shape. "Do not be alarmed," he answered. Gone was the upbeat, blaring sound in his voice, replaced by a formal, computerized one. "This unit's firmware has been recently updated following needed repairs. My new prime directive is to: DEFEND; the designated area of: FYRESTONE."

"See? He's fine," Ruby said as the girl in white approached. "Hey. You, uh, talked with Blake right? About the woman we saw?"

The girl in white halted and fixed on her, then at Claptrap. "She mentioned it. I don't think it's worth discussion."

"Oh come on," she ventured, "you don't think that was a little weird? Did that lady tell you the same thing she told us? About h-"

Claptrap flagged his arms again, his single brimming hot red.

"Overriding prime directive!" he announced, clicking and beeping.

The scorched, right half of his body gave off a spark that made the Schnee girl bounce on her feet.

"New prime directive acquired," he continued, pointing directly at Ruby. "Protect subject: RUBY ROSE, at all costs!"

That wiggled her ears. "You... what?"

"Clarification: the prime directive of this CL4PTP unit is now the protection and service of user designation: RUBY ROSE," the machine said, shifting into that blaring, mechanical voice.

Schnee's mouth curled. "Unreal."

"Nice going sis," said Yang, shaking her head. "You fixed it, you bought it."

Realizing what Claptrap had said, Ruby weakened, dropping to her knees in front of the yellow, pyramid-shaped robot. Her jaw wobbled with joy, she stuttered for breath as she pulled the little robot into a hug, against her better judgment.

"You," she crooned, snuggling closer, "...are the... _cutest_ robot companion a girl could ask for!"

Claptrap yelped at the contact, but after a few seconds, he returned her hug cautiously. "Best friend?"

Ruby leaned away, pushing the robot's face into view. "The best," she declared. Her eyes widened with an epiphany. This wasn't just finding a stray puppy on the street, or building a gun deemed illegal in thirty different quadrants. No. This went deeper than that. "I have to pick a name for you!"

"Um, my present identification is CL4PTP INAC..."

"No!" Her fist clapped against her palm. "A better name! We have to make you stronger, make you sound cooler! Deadlier! Ooh, and not only that, you have to start calling me sensei from this point forward!" she said, hands on her hips.

"Sensei?"

"Yes." Did she stutter?

"Er, very well. 'Sensei' it is... er, sensei!"

The girl in white jumped in. "I don't mean to interrupt... whatever it is you're doing right now, but I need to know if there's any other place I might obtain transportation. I also need a bit of information from that robot."

Claptrap popped forward and hiked his pants up defiantly, or the front of his body anyway. "Now that I have been reprogrammed to serve: SEMPAI," the voice, this time, sounded effeminate, "I am only authorized to dole out information with her permission!"

"What?" Schnee stamped her foot then, growling. "You can't be serious!"

Ruby scratched the back of her head, wanting to be anywhere but there. Schnee's glare heated and her splutters became more violent. Ruby glanced at her sister for backup; Yang merely shrugged. When she looked again, Schnee thrust her arm out.

"Look _you_, _you _... I'm sorry."

Ruby nearly stumbled. "Gha? Wait... seriously?"

"I'm sorry; it's just that, I'm on this planet looking for people, people I _must_ find without delay. I can't do that without a vehicle, and without knowing where they are. So please, just tell him to answer my questions so I can be on my way."

Ruby straightened. "Yeah, it's um, fine. Just let me see if can sort this out." She turned to Claptrap. "Could you... answer her questions?"

The assassinbot nodded with his entire body. "Yes, ma'am!"

"Thank goodness," Schnee exhaled, crouching down as Claptrap wheeled over to her, looking him in the ey. Her hand pulled a white device from the same side of her dress with the torn sleeve, and she held it in front of him. "CLP4TP, I want you to analyze the names on this list and tell me the locations of any that you recognize."

"I _can_-_not_ do that!"

Schnee blinked. "Why not!?" she gasped.

"I have only been authorized to vocally respond to any _questions_ you ask. _Not_ direct commands."

Ruby heard Yang snicker behind her. Exasperated, Schnee tilted her head slowly, and Ruby gave her an apologetic grin. "Claptrap ... just ... do what she asks you to do for now."

"Yes, sempai!"

Schnee let out a heavy sigh. "Thank you." She held the device up again, letting the robot focus on it with his lens. A faint, holographic light seeped over it, scanning the contents on the device.

Ruby took the beeping noises he emitted as a good sign.

::::

"What about the bandits? Yang and I want to get out of Fyrestone too, but we can't just walk away knowing that bandits will come back and ransack the place." Ruby asked, casually kicking her legs back and forth above the table in Zed's makeshift operating room. After fixing him, Claptrap promised to accompany her, and said that the only person who would know of a way out of Fyrestone was Zed himself.

Zed closed the garage door behind them again, somehow more anxious after they'd wiped out the bandit's patrols. "There's a reward for Nine-Toes' head. Problem is, nobody can find him! But if anyone did, I'd bet my life it's T.K Baha. He lives a little-ways south from here, over that hill you saw by the entrance. His wife was killed by a Skag years back, and he's made it his life's mission to take down every last one of the bastards."

She clenched the end of the table and stared at the floor. "But, this T.K person, he can help us find Nine-Toes?"

"He's your best chance. Blind as a bat, but he knows the lay of the land better than 'anybody." Zed put his hand on his face and rubbed the surgical mask. "Won't do us any good though. Nine-Toes' got scouts up in a small outpost outside of town, reportin' our every move back to him. We need to take care of them before contacting T.K, or we'd be putting him in even greater danger."

"We still need a vehicle," Schnee said, trying to get back to their previous topic.

"_And_ we need to figure a way over Piss Wash Hurdle," Yang added.

"And like I said when you asked me the first time, the only car I know about is that piece of junk out front. Now unless you girls want to fix her up instead of wasting valuable scrap, like 'ya did earlier..." Ruby didn't like the foul look in his eye, or the way the doctor's eyes swayed toward Claptrap. "I'd suggest you call for a taxi with your off-world satellite phones, 'cause I don't know what else to tell you."

He threw up his hands, sending them all back to the drawing board.

"Come on guys," Ruby cheered. "I fixed Claptrap, didn't I? Building us a car shouldn't be too hard."

And that was just the beginning. Once she finished the car, why stop there? She could start customizing Crescent Rose with Dahl technology, maintain and upgrade Claptrap into her own personal curbstomping weapon of mass destruction! Why, she could build a sentry turret that fired nuclear missiles. Granted, that last one was a bit far.

"Yeah you guys shouldn't worry. From what Zed's told me, you're all incredible fighters. Those bandits won't even stand a chance!"

She looked at the newcomer, the blond they'd rescued, who'd been rummaging through the junk in Zed's alcove.

She grinned back at Yang, who was sitting against a crate to her left, and the others around the room. "See? Jaune's optimistic."

"Yeah," said Yang. "We shouldn't worry. My baby sis's a genius at engineering. She built her scythe in a cave when she was twelve. With a box of scraps!"

Schnee turned her head. "Hmph. Forgive me if I'm a little skeptical. You are the one who went ballistic and put us in this situation in the first place."

Zed spoke up before Ruby could reply. "You know," he said. "I've gotta' to admit, the last few people I saw fight the way you girls do were hunting after that Vault-"

"We are!" Ruby and Yang threw their hands up.

Jaune cracked a weak smile and raised his mechanical hand. "I... _was_."

"-yeah well, I think you're going to make a real stir here on Pandora. If you feel like helping an old man out some more, or if you're looking for more work, there's a bounty board outside that still receives job contacts and info. If you're connected to the ECHOnet, the reward will be automatically transferred to your bank account."

"We're not bounty hunters," Schnee scoffed.

"She's right," said Blake. The girl in the black-white outfit paced from the wall, her shoes clopping in the quiet of the room. "For now, we focus on finding as many spare parts we can find, until we can salvage a vehicle on our own. But before that, we need to think about food and water."

"Oh yeah, that's right," agreed Ruby, "a single day here lasts, like, three to five days on any other planet."

Zed scooted next to the table and leaned against it. "I'll tell ya'what, other than a few military rations I've boosted, the only game you'll find out here is-"

"Rakk, Skag, and Bullymong, we know, we know," her sister said with mild irritation. "And none of those sound like great dinner options. Dad brought home a Skag for me to eat once, remember?"

"I don't remember that," said Ruby, "how was it?"

"I spent nearly an entire week heaving into a toilet, and I was excused from school for almost half a month for food poisoning!"

Zed seemed to shake his hand sympathetically.

"I guess," Schnee said after a long pause, "we'll just have to survive by feeding on the locals."

She covered her mouth with a hand, the tips of her cheeks rounding upward while they gaped at her. Claptrap stayed motionless. Zed carefully positioned himself behind the table.

"It was a joke. Come on now; stop looking at me like that. I'm not some barbaric cannibal."

A short, forced chuckle came from Jaune. Claptrap jounced suddenly, sounding some sort of alarm.

"Attention! Attention! A job was just posted to the Fyrestone Bounty Board over the ECHOnet! I will now play the audio file being transmitted!"

Ruby turned her ear to listen.

The voice coming from Claptrap's projection was male.

"Hey there y'all, this here's Scooter. I run the Catch-a-Ride stations and maintain the runners. If there's anyone out there by 'mah Fyrestone station, I'd sure appreciate ya' taking a look at it. My last diagnostic sweep said it's missing, uh..."

"A Runner?" asked Yang.

"It's the term we use for land vehicles on Pandora," answered Claptrap.

"...yeah, uh, the primary Digistruct module," Scooter's voice continued. "I know it's asking a lot, but I'd hit up Bone Head and his gang. Him and his bandits got a camp tucked right next to Fyrestone. 'Dem bastards probably took it. If you can get the module back and reinstall it, Scooter'll do you a solid and let you _catch a ride_ on one of my Runners, free of charge. Mmm-hmm-kay?"

Then the transmission ended, quieting the newly-informed party of seven.

::::

Ruby, Crescent Rose, and Claptrap journeyed down the weather-beaten road west of Fyrestone, occasionally peeking into the gorge that threatened below. Broken guiderails, chipped and scored with age, loitered on their left. Clouds strangled the ugly yellow sky into pee-colored pockets of light.

On foot, the trip took maybe twenty minutes.

Division of labor was trivial. Ruby wanted to make sure that the bandits didn't retaliate for the men they'd lost in Fyrestone, and Zed mentioned that there was an outpost beyond Fyrestone where the bandits would likely fan out from. Taking the outpost would buy them all some time to plan their next move. They needed to put a vehicle together. _She_ needed to put a vehicle together, and she didn't need bullets flying past her head while doing so.

At the same time, the T.K Baha person knew where to find Nine-Toes, the leader of the bandits around Fyrestone. Schnee volunteered to find him and ignored Zed's repeated warnings that they'd only be placing T.K in more danger. Despite that, he admitted that it was just as likely for T.K to be eaten by a roaming Skag as it was having a bullet in his back. It would be better for someone to go and check on him at least, and while the outpost was being dismantled, all the better.

The transmission Claptrap picked up pricked Zed's ears. He knew about Bone Head's gang of course; they were the second biggest harassment to Fyrestone. But they were dumb, apparently, because they'd taken over a mining facility near the town and chosen to stick it out there, despite the increasing number of Skags around their walls. Blake seemed the most determined to gather transportation, and volunteered to retrieve the Digistruct Module that Scooter guy mentioned.

"Fearless, bandit-killing sempai!" she heard Claptrap call from her side.

"What is it?" she replied, scanning the ridge to her far-left as they came upon some foreign buildings and a huge gate on the other side, "and it's not sem_pai_, Clap, its _sensei_."

The whirring noise told her that he was keeping pace with her, mixed with the occasional clack each time he hopped in excitement. For a tour guide that was reformatted into an assassin, he'd barely lost any of his goofiness. Not that she would have it any other way.

"Apologies warlord-sensei, it's just; I wanted to ask you a question."

They neared the end of the road, and Ruby sat on one knee, facing the bandit encampment. "Umm... shoot?"

Claptrap's wheels grinded on the dirt, charging up and then winding back, an imitation of a person walking in place. "You know that blonde you were talking to back in Fyrestone?"

"Yang?"

"Yeah, her. I mean, wow. They don't _make_ ladies that fine on Pandora, let me tell _you_-"

"Sisters."

"Huh? What's that?"

She frowned. "She's my _sister_, dude." The blade of Crescent Rose stabbed into the ground with a clang in front of her.

"Oh. Oh!" Claptrap howled at the discovery. "I didn't mean-"

"Just... _please_, don't do it again," she interrupted, checking to see if Crescent Rose was balanced. She jerked the handlebar a few times, and the scythe resisted, pulling back with each push. Good. "She's not into robots, so don't bother asking."

Claptrap moved beside her. "But more to the point."

"Point being?" she said, squinting.

"It's her attitude-" _Bang_.

The first shot deafened. Yards, meters away, an orange-goggled man's head shattered, along with the rest of his collarbone. Heads and bodies twisted in the direction of the terrible crunch and the thump shortly after.

"-that turbos my circuits, _if you know what I mean_."

Ruby yanked back a lever; the last last round ejected from Crescent Rose with a _pop_. "What _do_ you mean?"

The little robot bristled. "I _mean_, she's your sister, right? She's supposed to be your BFF. Your heterosexual life partner!"

The bandits by the outpost swept around the perimeter, pointing their pistols and rifles around, waving their sticks and clubs. She hardly moved. Another bullet raced across the expanse, and another. Two bodies flew off their feet and skidded over the ground; one grasping at the stump where his left once was, the other laid out on the ground,

"I'm not sure what you mean by that."

Chirps of panic made their way over the divide. Another bullet popped from the chamber, but before she fired again, one of the bandits threw down his rifle.

"Stop shooting, I surrender!"

She stared down at him, blinked, and turned her attention to the remaining bandits, who'd realized they were being massacred and attempted moving closer to the shooter.

"Nobody shoots my buddies BUT ME!" one of the remaining four shouted.

She squeezed the trigger, aiming just a little below his jaw.

There was another whir on her left side. Claptrap had changed positions. "It's just, I'm a little surprised that the biological sister of my warlord-sensei would be so callous as to stay home and bake cookies while you rush into harm's way."

Ruby glanced away from the bandits. "Oh get out," she said, snickering. "Yang loves me. And I can take care of myself, thank you very much."

"Not that I, your stalwart defender, believe that I am incapable of protecting you, nor you, yourself."

She focused back on the bandits. Two more tried to negotiate the ravine in some poor definition of a surprise attack. There was the one cowering in the middle of the outpost, shivering by the dead bodies of his comrades. Another hid behind a familiar red chest with green sensors on it.

"You never shoulda' come here and now you're gonna pay!"

She pressed the trigger again, and the nearest bandit cursed as his ally was flung backward, spewing scarlet. "That's sweet Clap, but you're exaggerating things."

She paused. She'd insisted to Yang that they find a way to repair Claptrap, which had paid off better than she ever could have asked for; a good deed, nothing more. She didn't mind being separate from her sister, and she didn't need a baby sitter. The last two years proved that.

Plus, _someone_ needed to stay in town to watch over Zed and Jaune.

"I certainly hope not," Claptrap persisted, reaching for something with his hand. "My files indicate that friendship is defined by mutual trust and support. I've never had a lot of friends, let alone a BFF... but if I did, I'd want them to _charge_ into battle _alongside_ me!"

She had the second-to-last bandit in her sights. Gradually, her finger eased from the trigger.

"Assuming _that_ definition is wrong, I'd have to complete a long and tedious definition dump on the word 'friendship' throughout my CPU." He sighed. "What a chore _that_ would be!"

The bandit she'd sighted grew bolder, incensed after witnessing his friend explode right in front of him. The orange circles of his goggles fixed on her location.

"A little girl!?" he screamed. "You've got to be kidding me, f-UGHK!"

A metal star punctured the man's forehead. His hands went up, squirming, pawing at the wound until death was no longer in question. He collapsed.

Claptrap shrilled and pumped his clamps. "Woo! _Yes_, yes! I am _never_ washing that throwing star again!"

::::

Staring at his own severed arm preserved like a bloody pickle in a jar, Jaune decided he didn't really like Zed's office. He was thankful for having his life saved, really he was.

He didn't have any money. The money he'd brought with him had vanished, and he had only himself to blame. He'd wandered, he'd loitered, and he'd gotten lost. It was a miracle he'd managed to limp his way into Fyrestone with arm guts leaking out of him.

Instead, Zed asked him for one thing in return. Seeing that the arm was laying in a pool of his own blood in the middle of Zed's operating room, Jaune agreed to the payment. Minutes later, with the babes out and about, looking for a way out of this place, Zed took his arm out of the cooler and stuffed it inside a jar.

Jaune didn't know why, or if it was even medically sound. And he didn't want to know why. He just wanted to be far away from it.

His surroundings didn't improve once he got outside. He'd already absorbed the glorified garbage dump after stepping out to give that Blake girl and Zed a chance to talk.

Man, that Blake was a total babe.

And even she paled next to the white-haired angel she'd arrived with.

Jaune looked past the graveyard to Fyrestone's entrance, and saw something rather... off.

"No," he whispered.

"No, no, no, no, no, no!"

She trudged in his direction, lumbering through the torn wireframe and into the graveyard, her left arm smeared in blood. His legs moved without command, sprinting toward her, every thought fleeting. When he reached her, she tumbled, and he caught her by the shoulders.

The obvious questions flooded out. Her neck and her shoulders sagged before going utterly limp. Hesitating, he placed his hand under her neck and supported it, the skin there sticky and warm. Her eyes twitched, refusing to close.

He asked her what happened for the sixth time, trying to make sure that she stayed conscious, not daring to leave her and run to find help. Her chest moved once. She was breathing, somewhat.

In a ragged breath, she informed him that she'd found T.K, killed by the bandits.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** This chapter was supposed to be completed by Wednesday, but I fell behind. I hope that didn't lose you. Also, because of today's date, I've removed the title of this chapter, and I'll re-upload it tomorrow with the proper title.

There's a couple of video game and movie references throughout the story. If you can find, deduce, or guess one of them, you get to be Watson and ask a question about the universe this story takes place in. provided it is relevant to this fic, RWBY, Borderlands, or all three. I consider this a big deal because I'm more of a "show'er" than a "teller", and answering small questions like "how old is this character" is usually something I prefer to do in the fic itself.

One reference, one answer. Spot enough of them and you'll get to read chapters earlier than everybody else.


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